LONGMONT -- An unused area of the Twin Peaks Mall was set to be the scene for a Boulder police SWAT training on Wednesday and Thursday, but a last-minute objection from Dillard's put the kibosh on the plans.

Boulder police spokeswoman Kim Kobel said the SWAT team, bomb squad, and negotiators were set for a two-day training at the mall, but were notified Tuesday that they would not be allowed to use the space because Dillard's officials objected.

"I don't know why they objected," she said. "It would have been nice to be able to train in a building that offered a realistic scenario."

Kobel said the department notified businesses in the mall that Boulder police vehicles and personnel would be at the property on Wednesday and Thursday, which apparently alerted Dillard's officials and raised the objection.

Kobel said police officials worked with NewMark Merrill, the mall's property management company, over the past couple of weeks planning the training exercise. The mall was set to allow the department to use the unoccupied space for free for two days.

The exercise was moved to the Boulder County Fire Training Center off of the Diagonal Highway.

"Our training was going to take place in a vacant area of the mall," Kobel said. "We shouldn't have impacted businesses."

NewMark Merrill Mountain States managing director and principal Allen Ginsborg said the property management company wanted to offer the vacant former Joslins building for the training. He said it is not accessible to other parts of the mall.

"We think these types of community first-responder exercises are especially valuable at this point in time," Ginsborg said.

He declined to characterize the nature of the objection from Dillard's, but said his company decided to accommodate them. He said the training was intended to benefit the community by allowing first responders a chance to train in the kind of environment they might encounter in reality."They seldom have access to facilities like this," he said.

A Dillard's representative did not immediately return phone calls on Wednesday afternoon.

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